June 16, 2003	Monday	Rabi-us-Sani 15, 1424

Basmati rice exporters to the UK will face the DNA crackdown if their samples will be found mixed with non-Basmati long grained varieties and could face penalty of up to 5000 pound sterling.Their rice samples will be subjected for DNA testing under the guidance issued on 25th March 2003, by Food Standards Agency (FSA) of the UK.

Recently, the ministry of food, agriculture and livestock indicated that they are planning to establish DNA testing facility for Basmati rice in collaboration with the FSA, and the ministry of commerce, and Rice Exporters Association of Pakistan (REAP).

Pakistan’s Basmati rice command a premium price in the international market due to its unique aroma, long and slender grain and elongation after cooking. This premium plus its increased popularity both in domestic and international market makes it a target for adulteration with cheaper, long grained non-Basmati varieties.

Furthermore, traditional Basmati varieties fetch high price as compared to hybrid Basmati. Basmati-370 and Kernel Basmati are categorized as traditional Basmati while Basmati-385, Super Basmati and Basmati-198 are hybrid Basmati. The reason is to conserve ‘landraces’ (germplasm) of Basmati and maintain its identity and integrity as genetic erosion of these varieties is occurring very rapidly.

Extensive breeding programmes have been launched to develop high-yielding Basmati varieties due to tough competition in the international market.

Many high-yielding and resistance genes are being incorporated in the traditional varieties, thus sacrificing the low-yielding, susceptible to many biotic and abiotic stresses but high quality varieties.

In order to preserve this, precious landrace, buyers in the European Union are paying more (abatement price) as compared to hybrid/evolved Basmati.

The effort to utilize bio-technological tools in the form of DNA fingerprinting in the UK is not a recent phenomenon. The FSA in the UK launched a multimillion-dollar DNA fingerprinting programme to check the mixing of non-Basmati rice with Basmati rice. The Nottingham University, UK, initiated such studies in 1998. A meeting of all stakeholders was held at Export Promotion Bureau (EPB), Lahore, in December 1999 to draw out a strategy for Pakistani rice exporters. A small project was submitted to REAP in January 2000 to establish such facility in National Institute for Biotechnology and Genetic Engineering (NIBGE), Faisalabad.

However, no funding was provided. In such scenario NIBGE launched the testing programme from the funding provided by PAEC. This centre is actively engaged with the DNA fingerprinting of rice, cotton, wheat and legumes. It is also working on identification and differentiation of Basmati and non-Basmati rice varieties at molecular level. Polymorphic molecular markers, which could distinguish Basmati and non-Basmati varieties, have already been identified. Moreover, conditions for the isolation of DNA from milled and brown rice grains have been optimized. The establishment of this kind of facility would enable our rice exporters to market Pakistani Basmati with confidence and could face the challenge of DNA crackdown by providing the national certificates of DNA Testing.

The DNA-based fingerprinting method can distinguish between closely related cultivars and also different Basmati varieties using a sample of white milled grains. Five Pakistani and 11 Indian varieties have been approved by the respective authorities and included in the list of approved Basmati varieties by FSA as listed in the Table below.

The Indian government has already taken steps to stop the mixing in Basmati. In order to check this practice the Indian Ministry of Commerce has fixed the standards and classified 11 varieties of Basmati into 3 categories: Premium Indian Basmati; Indian Basmati (hybrid varieties) and long grain aromatic rice. Furthermore, being a sole competitor of Basmati, India has also initiated the work to fingerprint all her traditional and Basmati rice varieties and is planning to devise a method to issue clearance certificate. India is also exploiting the lack of technology to our exporters and defaming Pakistan Basmati as inferior and low quality.

Recently in an issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA (Year 02, Vol. 99 pp 5836-5841), Indian scientists have published the results of DNA fingerprinting of Basmati rice varieties from India and Pakistan. They showed different clusters of Basmati land races (Bas. 370, Dehraduni, Taraori, Ranbir Basmati and Basmati 386) and evolved Basmati varieties (Basmati 385, Super Basmati, Kernel, Haryana Gaurav, Haryana Basmati, Mahi Sughanda, Kasturi, Terricot, Sherbati and Pusa Basmati), whereas semi dwarf and non-Basmati varieties were in different clusters.

The study has been conducted at Centre for DNA Fingerprinting and Diagnostics (CDFD), Nacharam Hyderabad, India, with the financial assistance from the ministry of commerce. Many physical and physio-chemical parameters such as length, width, translucency, degree of milling, colour, moisture content, shape size, whiteness, chalkiness, amylose content, protein content, gel consistency, volume of expansion of cooked rice, aroma, stickiness, and hardness and much more are the grain quality indicators.

Therefore, not a single criterion can distinguish Basmati rice from other rices. A harmonious combination of above quality parameters can confirm the high quality Basmati after extensive chemical testing and thorough physical examination of rice grains. For example to test the aroma, grains are cooked in hot water and the fragrance is smelled and assessed by a group of individuals. However, variation occurs between analysts in their ability to detect fragrance or associated flavour.

Moreover, expert analysts are required for this purpose. These quality traits are also dependent on the environment, soil, biotic and abiotic stresses and cultural management practice during plant growth and grain ripening. A little variation in the growing conditions of Basmati rice can give the false results. Therefore, these tests require skill, keen observation and are also time consuming.

The DNA material contains all the information needed for an organism to grow and express itself and is not influenced by any environmental effects during the organism entire life.

Small amount of variation in the DNA of different individuals can be detected by amplifying the DNA to many folds using specific/short fragments (primers) of complementary DNA using polymerase chain reaction (PCR) technology. The DNA thus amplifies resolve on agarose gel according to the variation in the size of DNA. Thus a DNA fingerprint of any individual can be generated using different short primers and can be compared to another individual to detect any variation.

The competition in Basmati export is likely to grow stiffer in the future due to free trade under the WTO. Many non-traditional Basmati producing countries like the United States of America, Australia, Vietnam, Thailand etc., have expanded and intensified their Basmati rice breeding programmes. Development and patenting of a Basmati type variety-Taxamati (Basmati 6187) by the American company Rice-Tech is a glaring example of these efforts. The export shipments will increasingly be analysed for undesirable substances (pesticide residues, aflatoxin, heavy metals, GMOs etc.).

Our agriculture policies should be geared to address these issues. There are few laboratories in our country like NIBGE, NIAB Faisalabad and HEJ, Karachi University, which are well equipped and have expertise of international standards. Most recently, cereal grain testing labs, under the Pakistan Agriculture Research Council are being established at Karachi and Islamabad. Similarly, newly established Food Technology Institute at the University of Agriculture, Faisalabad will be functional in July 2003.

There is an urgent need to make use of all these centres and provide necessary inputs to upgrade them to international standards.

Keeping the above facts in mind, there is an urgent need to preserve our rice landraces and perform DNA fingerprinting of all the available landraces, traditional Basmati varieties and the evolved/hybrid Basmati rice varieties.

This would help us in maintaining the identity of our rice varieties being exported and also we could be able to defend our Basmati varieties if subjected to the DNA fingerprinting in European countries.